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Another Receipt for Gravy Soup

A beef-based soup thickened with butter and flour, flavored with soy sauce, sherry, and cayenne pepper.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 13 ingredients
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Why it works: Beef and onion are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 17,092 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Another Receipt for Gravy Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Make the broth

  1. Combine the beef, onions, carrots, and bouillon in a deep stewpan.

  2. Set over a brisk fire until the broth reduces.

  3. Boil gently until it forms a glaze at the bottom.

  4. Add the proper quantity of water.

  5. Finish the soup as per the previous recipe.

Brown the beef

  1. Dredge the beef with flour.

  2. Season the beef with salt and pepper.

  3. Fry the beef until clear brown.

Stew and finish

  1. Stew the beef for six hours with 1 pint of water for each pound of meat and the vegetables.

  2. Add the fried onions to every 3 quarts of soup.

  3. Strain the soup.

  4. Remove fat from the soup.

  5. Thicken the soup with butter and flour mixed smoothly.

  6. After 20 minutes, add soy sauce, sherry, and cayenne pepper.

  7. Serve the soup hot.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Beef + oniontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,092 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  2. Beef + peppertop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,971 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  3. Pepper + oniontop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  4. Beef + meattop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,533 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

  5. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Flour and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Beef
Gives the soup its meaty flavour and body as it stews for hours.
Flour
Browns the beef when dredged, and thickens the soup when mixed with butter.
Butter
Adds richness and, blended with flour, helps thicken the soup smoothly.
Onions
Fried and added to the soup, they contribute sweetness and savoury depth.
Soy sauce
Adds savoury, salty depth to the finished soup.
Sherry
Adds aroma and a touch of acidity when stirred in near the end.

The step that matters

Thicken the soup with butter and flour mixed smoothly. Flour must be blended thoroughly into the butter before or as it meets the hot liquid. If it goes in dry or in clumps, starch grains stick together as lumps and the soup stays uneven in texture.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, flour, pepper, meat, butter, sauce, sherry):

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Shallotfits better
  3. Potatofits about as well
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, flour, pepper, meat, butter, sauce, sherry. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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